I like York station; it takes me back to my childhood.
The first York railway station was a temporary wooden building on Queen Street outside the walls of the city, opened in 1839 by the York and North Midland Railway.
It was succeeded in 1841, inside the walls, by what is now York old railway station. In due course, the irksome requirement that through trains between London and Newcastle needed to reverse out of the old York station to continue their journey necessitated the construction of a new through station outside the walls.
This was the present station, designed by the North Eastern Railway architects Thomas Prosser and William Peachey, which opened in 1877. It had 13 platforms and was at that time the largest station in the world.
As part of the new station project, the Royal Station Hotel (now The Royal York Hotel), designed by Peachey, opened in 1878. In 1909 new platforms were added, and in 1938 the current footbridge was built and the station resignalled.
The building was heavily bombed during the Second World War.[1]
On one occasion, on 29 April 1942,[2] 800 passengers had to be evacuated from a Kings Cross-Edinburgh train which arrived during a bombing raid.[1]On the same night, two railway workers were killed, one being station foreman William Milner (born 1900[2]), who died after returning to his burning office to collect his first aid kit.
He was posthumously awarded the King’s commendation for gallantry.[2] A plaque in his memory has been erected at the station.[1][2]
The station was extensively repaired in 1947.
I first went there as a baby in 1963, there was always a big Christmas tree and presents for everyone underneath it.
Of course it’s a lot busier now, and not how I remember it, but it still has that magnificent roof that always brings me back, and with a wider lens I could really do it justice.
